Workforce Planning

Chapter 4

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Do we plan to make a product? (e.g. Samsung)
Do we plan to provide services? (e.g. Netflix)
• For each product or service that we provide in the
organization, we have to identify the work processes that
create that product or service

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 Organizational output

• The first thing we analyze is the end result of our processes:

our expected organizational outputs, or what the customer
wants from us. We are working backwards
• E.g. “if we decided to make a desk but we don’t identify what
kind of desks were going to make, then, we wouldn’t know if
we need skilled craftsman, metalworkers, or just skilled
assemblers”

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 Work Flow Analysis

• What must be done to produce a product or service:

• Identify expected result (organizational outputs)
• Determine steps required to create the end result
• Spot inputs necessary to carry out and perform the same tasks (i.e.,
the 4 Ms: machines, material, manpower, and money)

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 Work Flow Analysis

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 JOB ANALYSIS

Once we understand the workflows in the

organization, the next thing that we need
to do is figure out which parts of the
workflows are done by each person.

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 Job Analysis

• Identifies work performance and working conditions

• Basis for HR
• HR planning
• Job evaluation for compensation
• Staffing (recruiting and selection)
• Training
• Performance management
• Maintaining a safe work environment

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 Job Analysis Outcomes

• Job description 
• Identification of the major tasks, duties, and
responsibilities that are components of a job
• Job specification 
• Identification of the qualifications of a person who
should be capable of doing the job tasks in the job
description

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 How Job Analysis affect Managers?

• Managers must have detailed information about all the jobs in

their work groups so that they can understand the workflow
process
• Managers need to understand the job requirements in their
work groups so that they can make intelligent hiring, training,
and promotion decisions
• Every manager is responsible for conducting performance
evaluations to ensure that all employees are performing their
jobs satisfactorily.

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 Databases and Job Analysis

• Several databases can be helpful with job analysis. One free

resource, the U.S. Department of Labor’s O*NET, identifies six
categories within its occupational classification structure:
• Worker characteristics
• Worker requirements
• Experience requirements
• Occupational requirements
• Workforce characteristics
• Occupation-specific information

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 Five Common Job Analysis Methods

• Questionnaires
• Interviews (usually of job incumbents)
• Diaries (usually kept by job incumbents)
• Observation of workers in jobs
• Subject matter experts (SMEs)

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 Do We Really Have “Jobs” Anymore?

• Job analysis is valuable when jobs are stable. It offers less

value when jobs are not well-defined
• Job analysis is of greater value to organizations making a
product than to those providing a service

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 Task Versus Competency-Based Jobs

•  Task-based job
• A function of tasks performed within the job
• Best for jobs in stable, bureaucratic organizations

•  Competency-based job 
• Looks at capabilities an individual needs to succeed in the job
• Best for jobs in less structured organizations

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 Examples of Tasks and Competencies
in a Sales Role
• Sales tasks 
• Determine pricing
• Generate sales quotes
• Transact sales orders

• Sales competencies
• Ambition, drive, and desire to succeed
• Ability to manage the sales process/cycle
• Talent to convince and persuade while converting prospects to sales

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 Job Design vs. Job Redesign

•  Job design 
• Identifies tasks that employees are responsible for and how those
tasks will be accomplished

•  Job redesign 
• Changes tasks or how they are performed. Job redesign is about
working smarter, not harder

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Organizational Structure and Job Design

• Rigid bureaucratic structures with strong centralized decision

making need jobs that are controlled by an authority
• Relaxed, flatter structures with autonomy need jobs that take
advantage of autonomy

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Approaches to Job Design and Redesign

• Mechanistic job design: emphasizes task specialization, skill

simplification, and repetition 
• Biological: focuses on how the body works to minimize strain 
• Perceptual/motor: keeps employees within mental
limitations 
• Motivational: focuses on affecting psychological meaning
and motivational potential

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 JOB CHARACTERISTICS MODEL
(JCM)
Provides a conceptual framework
for designing or enriching jobs based
on core job characteristics

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 The Job Characteristics Model (JCM)

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 JCM (5) CORE JOB
CHARACTERISTICS
• Skills variety – is the number of diverse tasks that make up a job and the number
of skills used to perform the job
• Task identity – is the degree to which an employee performs a whole identifiable
task. (e.g. did the employee put together an entire television or just place the
screen set?)
• Task significance – is an employee’s perception of the importance of task to
others-the organization, the dept, coworkers, and or customers
• Autonomy – is the degree to which the employee has discretion to make
decisions in planning, organizing, and controlling the task performed
• Feedback - is the extent to which employees find out how well they perform their
tasks

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 Designing Motivational Jobs

• Job simplification
• Eliminate tasks, combine tasks, and/or change task sequence

• Job expansion
• Rotation, enlargement, and enrichment of jobs

• Work teams
• Integrated and self-managed

• Flexible work
• Flextime, job sharing, telecommuting, and compressed work weeks

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 Job Design Options, Process, and JCM

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 Job Design Is Country-Specific

• Jobs in the United States tend to focus on motivational

design
• Jobs in countries that focus on basic manufacturing or
routine service jobs are often designed to be mechanistic
• Jobs in countries that focus on knowledge creation and
innovation are often designed to be organic
• Jobs in collectivist cultures tend toward collaboration

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 HR Forecasting

• HR forecasting identifies the estimated supply and demand

for the different types of human resources in the organization
over some future period, based on analysis of past and
present demand
• Methods can be quantitative or qualitative

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 Quantitative Forecasting

• Trend analysis 
• Reviewing historical items (such as revenues) and relating changes to
business factors to form a predictive chart

• Ratio analysis 
• Reviewing historical data and calculating proportions between a
business factor (such as production) and number of employees needed

• Regression analysis 
• Identifies relationship between a series of variable data points to
forecast future variables

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 Regression Analysis

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 Qualitative Forecasting

• Non-quantitative methods are usually based on knowledge of

a pool of experts in a subject or an industry
• The experts work from the quantitative predictions but also
assess industry, economic, and other factors

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 Measuring Absenteeism and Turnover

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 Succession Planning

• Type of forecasting done to:

• Have people ready to move into vacated positions
• Make predictions for leadership requirements
• Prepare new leaders to take on higher positions or recruit people

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 Internal Labor Supply and Demand
Employers need the right numbers of employees with the right
skill sets in the organization at the right time

 Options for a surplus   Options for a shortage

● Downsizing and layoffs ● Overtime
● Pay reduction ● Temporary or contract
● Work sharing employees
● Natural attrition ● Retrain employees
● Hiring freeze ● Outsourcing
● Retraining and transfers ● Turnover reduction
● Early retirement ● Hire new employees
● Technological innovation
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 Trends and Issues in HRM

• Gig work – work on distinct pieces that can be farmed out to

independent contractors or some other form of temporary
labor – is increasing at a very rapid pace
• Automation – work that was once done by a person but that is
now relegated to machines or other technology – is improving
at a rapid pace

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